Public support for better controls on lobbying and industry influence in Aotearoa New Zealand: findings from a national survey

Effective cancer prevention depends on policy and regulatory environments that support health and reduce population exposure to carcinogenic risks.¹ In Aotearoa New Zealand, exposure to harmful commodities including tobacco, workplace chemicals, alcohol and unhealthy food environments contributes substantially to preventable cancer burden, particularly for cancers that are unequally distributed across the population.²

Te Tiriti o Waitangi is meant to guide health policy in Aotearoa New Zealand, affirming Māori tino rangatiratanga and requiring the Crown to actively protect Māori health and achieve equity.³ Persistent inequities in cancer incidence and mortality between Māori and non-Māori reflect, in part, long-standing failures to meet these obligations, particularly in the prevention of cancers linked to commercial products and environments.⁴

Policy responses to harmful commodities do not occur in a neutral setting. Well-established international literature describes how commercial actors influence health policy and public discourse to protect commercial interests, including through lobbying, strategic framing of evidence, promotion of voluntary self-regulation and efforts to delay or weaken regulatory action.⁵ These activities are now widely understood as part of the “commercial determinants of health”, a concept used to describe how private sector practices shape exposure to health risks and contribute to inequities in non-communicable diseases, including cancer.⁵

The Government is a signatory to the World Health Organization (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), which includes an obligation under Article 5.3 to protect against tobacco industry interference in health policy.⁶ No comparable conventions exist for other harmful commodity industries despite evidence of similar forms of influence.^7,8 Across these sectors, shared strategies can undermine evidence-based cancer prevention policies, especially where commercial actors are positioned as legitimate participants in health policy processes.⁷ Furthermore, there is evidence that the WHO FCTC Article 5.3 is poorly implemented in Aotearoa New Zealand,⁹ with calls to enact it into legislation.¹⁰

Unlike most Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, Aotearoa New Zealand does not have any lobbying regulations,¹¹ and lobbying in Aotearoa New Zealand has been relatively sparsely documented.¹² Attempts to regulate lobbying previously failed with the Lobbying Disclosure Bill voted down in 2012, partly because of the ambiguity defining what a lobbyist was.¹³ It would have included a lobbyist register, mandatory code of conduct and require annual returns to be filed with the Auditor General.¹⁴ However, recent research has attempted to document some of the ways harmful industries lobby in Aotearoa New Zealand, finding that industry actors build long-term relationships with political insiders through repeated, friendly and low-pressure interaction.¹⁴ As a result, vested and commercial interests currently have excessive influence on public policymaking. An imbalance of influence and power can undermine democratic accountability and lead to decisions that have negative effects on the health and wellbeing of people and the environment.⁵ Aotearoa New Zealand has been falling in Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index since 2015.¹⁵

Several recent incidents have highlighted the lack of regulation and the unequal access harmful industries have on health policy decision making. A 2023 Radio New Zealand investigation titled “Mate, Comrade, Brother” brought attention to this.¹⁶ It highlighted the many examples of the “revolving door” in Aotearoa New Zealand, where people move between government and lobbying roles and may misuse insider knowledge or connections.¹⁶ In 2024, it was revealed that Aotearoa New Zealand had opted out of new infant formula standards to improve labelling amid the revelation of extensive lobbying by multinational dairy companies.¹⁷ In 2025, emails released under the Official Information Act 1982 showed that Ministry of Health – Manatū Hauora officials were frequently communicating with alcohol lobbyists, sharing draft policy documents and inviting industry feedback on how public health money should be spent.^18,19 Taken together, these public accounts are reinforced by internal industry communications, which provide insight into how such access is perceived and leveraged by commercial actors. Internal documents from vaping company JUUL revealed that while vaping laws were being developed, tobacco giant Philip Morris International had given a draft piece of vaping regulation to the Government’s coalition partner NZ First, who “put it in the policy mix”.²⁰ Shane Jones is described as a NZ First MP who “supports companies that support him. Known to respond to relationship building on the part of companies.”²⁰ Internal JUUL documents stated that “The one thing that could drastically change timing and content would be New Zealand First Leader Winston Peters intervening. JUUL should not worry about that. Any regulation he champions is likely to be very industry friendly and highly geared towards commercial interests in the sector.”²⁰

Despite these high-profile incidents, little political action to address them has followed. Recent calls for further lobbying regulations in Aotearoa New Zealand such as the “Level the Playing Field” campaign highlight measures needed.^12,21 These include a public register of lobbying, limits on the “revolving door”, mandatory codes of conduct, review of the Official Information Act and tighter restrictions on political donations. Importantly, they also call for the creation of an integrity commission to monitor and enforce compliance.

Public opinion plays a critical role in informing the political feasibility of regulatory action and in shaping how industry influence is contested in democratic settings. However, there is limited empirical evidence on how Aotearoa New Zealanders view lobbying and industry influence in relation to cancer-relevant industries, or the extent to which public attitudes align with recommended stronger protections against commercial interference.^12,21

This report forms part of a series examining cancer-related policies and public opinion in Aotearoa New Zealand. Using data from a national census-weighted political survey, we aim to quantify and describe public attitudes towards lobbying and industry influence, both in general and specifically for unhealthy food (including sugary drinks) and alcohol.

Methods

This paper draws on data from a nationwide, cross-sectional online survey designed to assess public views on cancer related policies in Aotearoa New Zealand. Comprehensive methodological details are provided in the published study methodology paper in this series and only essential details will be covered here.²² In brief, adults aged 18 years and older were recruited via a large commercial online research panel. The survey was administered between November and December 2025 using a structured questionnaire. Most items were closed and assessed views across multiple cancer policy domains, including prevention, early detection, treatment, supportive care and cross-cutting policy issues relevant to cancer control.

Respondents were asked to indicate their level of support for a series of policy statements related to industry influence and lobbying (Appendix A). These comprised the following: i) politicians and their staff should be required to wait at least 1 year after leaving government before taking employment as lobbyists for the junk food, alcohol or sugary drinks industries; ii) all lobbyists should be required to adhere to a clear set of rules to ensure fair and responsible engagement with government decision making; iii) the alcohol industry should not be involved in the development of government policies (local or national) aimed at reducing alcohol related harm; and iv) the junk food and sugary drinks industry should not be involved in the development of government policies (local or national) designed to create healthy food environments. Responses were recorded using six-point options ranging from strongly support to strongly oppose with an additional option not to answer that question.

Total (design and poststratification) weights were applied to align the final analytic sample with 2023 New Zealand Census benchmarks for age groups, gender and Māori ethnicity as explained in detail in the methodology publication. We estimated an effective sample size of 1,161 after weighting, which provides an approximate worst-case 95% margin of error for a full-sample percentage of ±2.9%.

Ethical approval

Ethical approval processes and Māori consultation procedures are detailed in the methodology publication.²² Ethical approval was granted by the University of Otago Human Ethics Committee (25/1184).

Results

Results are summarised in Table 1 (overall) and Table 2 (by voting intentions), with further stratified analyses reported in the Appendix tables (Appendix B). We are unable to provide a response rate as the surveying was conducted by the market research company. Respondents were able to indicate do not want to answer but could not otherwise skip questions.

View Table 1–2.

Mandatory rules for all lobbyists drew the highest degree of support overall (Table 1). Support by voting patterns was overwhelmingly positive with over 80% support from voters for all parties including 83.2% for undecided (Table 2).

The 1-year “cooling-off” period had 74.4% (including 36.3% strongly) support overall (Table 1). By voting intention, support was high (above two-thirds) among all parties (Table 2).

Excluding junk food and sugary drink industries from health policy development had over three-quarters support overall (79.0%, including 36.3% strongly) (Table 1). By voting intention there were clear majorities in favour for all parties, ranging from 70.9% for Te Pāti Māori to 88.5% for the Green Party (Table 2).

Excluding the alcohol industry from health policy development had 74.8% support overall (including 34.6% strongly) (Table 1). By voting intention, support ranged from 80.2% for the Green Party to 64.6% for ACT and 64.3% for undecided voters (Table 2).

Across all measures, strong support generally rose with age. By prioritised ethnicity, support was high overall. There were no notable differences between males and females (Appendix B).

Discussion

The results show that there is strong public support for a range of measures to regulate lobbying in Aotearoa New Zealand. Importantly, this support was found regardless of voting intention or ethnicity, only twice dipping below two-thirds support for all policies across all political party voters and all prioritised ethnicities. While voting intention was examined to assess political feasibility across parties, the consistency of support across ethnic groups, particularly among Māori, has distinct relevance in the context of Te Tiriti o Waitangi and obligations to actively protect Māori health. This suggests that there is low political risk for a government to introduce stronger systems that protect public policies from undue vested and commercial influence.

The highest support in this survey was for mandatory rules for all lobbyists. While there was some recent political interest in a code of conduct²³ for lobbyists, little progress appears to have been made, with no updates since 2024.²⁴

Our survey found strong support for a 1-year cooling-off period before former politicians/staff can move into a lobby role. The majority of OECD countries have some kind of cooling-off period for public officials, ranging from around 1 to 5 years.²⁵ As one of a number of examples, a cooling-off period would have prevented the recent high-profile immediate transition of Kris Faafoi from minister to lobbyist.²⁶ The Prime Minister’s former Chief Press Secretary Hamish Rutherford started working for lobbying firm BRG immediately after leaving his role.²⁷ Former lobbyist Ben Craven, who worked as Health Minister Simeon Brown’s Press Secretary, left his role to work for lobbying firm Iron Duke Partners.²⁸ David Seymour’s ministerial advisor Stuart Wilson joined lobbying outfit Capital NZ.²⁸

When Radio New Zealand reported on the Ministry of Health – Manatū Hauora’s engagement with the alcohol industry, the deputy director stated that “Engaging with industry can, and has, yielded meaningful health gains for New Zealanders in the past—and will do so again.”²⁹ This is despite our survey finding that three-quarters of people support excluding the alcohol industry from policymaking related to reducing alcohol-related harm. Following the investigations, it was announced that the Ministry of Health – Manatū Hauora would establish new “rules of engagement” with the alcohol industry; however, these are yet to be published or implemented.²⁹

Trust in government and other democratic systems in Aotearoa New Zealand is falling. In the 2023 General Social Survey, trust in parliament decreased the most in 2023 compared with other institutions such as police, the health system and media, down from 5.7 out of 10 in 2021 to 4.9.³⁰ Another recent survey found that only 42% of people in Aotearoa New Zealand trust the government to act in people’s best interests most or all of the time and around a third think that government leaders abuse power most or all of the time.³¹ The cited recent incidents in Aotearoa New Zealand may, in part, have helped shape current public opinion and contributed to our findings of strong support for lobbying controls in this survey.

The overall strengths and limitations of this study are discussed in the methodology article.²² In short, these are a sample size that provided sufficient precision and the risks of selection and participation bias. Limitations specific to this paper include that while a definition of lobbyist was provided as a pop up in the survey, there is no universal agreed definition of “lobbyist” or what constitutes “lobbying” and this survey did not explore participants’ understanding of these terms or activities related to it. Furthermore, lobbying definitions have shifted over time and lobbying itself has become an increasingly complex activity.¹⁴ Early definitions focussed on efforts at direct communication and information sharing (which is seen to be how lobbying is traditionally understood), whereas more recent definitions encompass a much broader range of actions such as efforts to build relationships and shift public opinion.¹⁴ Future research could explore how Aotearoa New Zealanders understand and define lobbying and its activities and their attitudes and views on these.

Views on tobacco and vaping industry lobbying were not directly surveyed in this study. The question about regulating revolving doors between industry and government used the alcohol and unhealthy food industries as examples. The questions on exclusion from policymaking also focussed on the alcohol and unhealthy food industries as tobacco industry involvement in policymaking should be precluded by adherence to Article 5.3 of the WHO FCTC that Aotearoa New Zealand is a signatory to. However, the position of the vaping industry is less clear and Aotearoa New Zealand’s fall in global ranking in the 2025 Tobacco Industry Interference Index suggests a marked increase in tobacco industry interference in Aotearoa New Zealand has occurred in the past 2 years and that FCTC Article 5.3 is not being fully implemented.⁹ Hence, further research into the public’s views on tobacco and vaping industry lobbying and its regulation is warranted.

Conclusion

This survey provides timely evidence of strong public support regardless of political party vote for measures such as mandatory rules for lobbyists, cooling-off periods for government to lobbying roles and the exclusion of harmful industries from health policy development. Taken together, these findings reveal a clear disconnect between public preferences and current levels of lobbying regulation, transparency and political action in Aotearoa New Zealand. The government should bring Aotearoa New Zealand in line with other OECD countries and introduce measures that regulate lobbying activities to help protect policies, including cancer-related policies, from vested and commercial interests.

View Appendix.